Faith
by Scifiroots
Summary: A matter of faith and destiny. Brucecentric Gen... or preslash depending on how you read


Faith

By Clarity Scifiroots  
Disclaimers apply. (Some lines directly from the episode "Zion")  
**Fandom**: The Dead Zone**Characters**: Rose Lewis, David Lewis, Bruce, Johnny  
**Rating**: General  
**Summary**: A matter of faith and destiny. (Gen... or pre-slash g Depends how you read )  
Twenty-seventh day of June!fic For kneazles' nightmares request  
_Edited July 20, 2006_

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"My baby is burning up in there and you want me to quietly sit by and let him bake under those heavy blankets?"

"Rose, we want to get rid of that fever of his. It does him good to sweat it out. You can put a cool cloth on his forehead, but please take my advice and leave the blankets on. I'll be back in the morning and if the fever hasn't broken, we'll go from there."

"Thank you, Doctor. We appreciate you coming over so late," David said, smoothly cutting off further protests from his wife by laying a comforting hand on her shoulder.

"No problem at all. I'm confident Bruce will be up and running around again before Sunday Service. Good night."

Rose watched the men walk to the door and then turned away to go back to her son's room. "Oh, Baby Boy..." she murmured as she sat on the edge of the bed. Her son's face was contorted in feverish pain. He'd been crying out the last few hours, seemingly caught in the midst of some ongoing nightmare that she was helpless to free him from.

"...'maged'on? He's a..."

"Shh, Baby. Just a dream," Rose soothed, caressing Bruce's pale, sweating face with the back of her hand.

"Here, Honey." David set a bowl of cool water and a soft washcloth on the bedside table. Rose eagerly dampened the cloth and ran it over their son's face. She repeated the process a few times and then rinsed out the cloth before folding it and laying it on Bruce's forehead.

David sat behind his wife and wrapped his arms lovingly around her waist. "He'll be better soon, Rose."

"Our boy's never had worse than a sore throat and the chicken pox," she countered worriedly. "How could he have gotten so sick?"

"God has his plans," her husband said calmly. "We must trust He will guide Bruce on the path of recovery."

Rose sagged back into David's embrace with an unhappy sigh. "I know... I just hate seeing my baby suffer."

"Don't let our thirteen-year-old hear you call him that," David teased gently.

------

Rose had watched quietly while her son changed over the past few years—ever since the three-day fever that kept her up day and night. The differences had been subtle at first, easily excusable with the development of a boy growing up. Then there were more obvious changes.

She broke two plates the night Bruce had asked after supper, "How can you possibly believe in _any_thing we preach every Sunday?"

Startled, both parents turned wide-eyed gazes on their son. Carefully, David replied, "I read the morning paper. And I have faith in the teachings..."

"I don't." Rose dropped the plates in her hands with a loud crash. Bruce looked at her guiltily.

"Don't be ridiculous, Son," David said gruffly. "Now help your mother clean up."

That had hardly been the last time the subject came up. The older Bruce grew, the more outspoken he became on the subject of faith. Rose spent many nights laying awake trying to piece together what had caused the change. She realized eventually that there was something like fear flickering in her son's eyes whenever the subject of destiny came up or David spoke of God's plan. She wondered what had him so preoccupied.

------

David slept next to her, softly snoring, yet she felt too alert to sleep. She silently slipped out of bed and put on her bathrobe, making her way into the kitchen. To her surprise, Bruce was up and standing at the counter, staring out the window above the sink.

"Bruce?" she spoke quietly, hoping not to startle him. His expression, when he turned to face her, made her gasp in surprise and pain. "Oh, Baby..."

"Mom..." Bruce went to her side and wrapped her in his strong arms. He'd grown so big, somehow. She had to remind herself that he would be attending college in the fall.

"Why?" she whispered.

Bruce squeezed her tightly for a moment, then stepped back a pace so that he could look her in the eye. "I can't stay, Momma. I just _can't_... and I don't know how to explain."

"My baby's been so restless..." Rose held his face between her hands and regarded him with sad eyes. She could see the hint of fear in addition to determination and regret. In her bones she could feel how much he truly believed that he needed to go. She nodded regretfully and embraced him tightly. "I wish you wouldn't go, but maybe you have to. Maybe it's what God intended."

He shivered in her hold. "Please," he said softly.

Rose shook her head unrepentantly. "Even if you don't believe, Baby, I do. I'll pray every night that you find what you need."

"I love you," Bruce said, kissing her cheek.

"I know you do, Baby. I love you so much."

------

Rose found herself floating somewhere in the state of vague awareness of unconsciousness the night after her husband's funeral. Down the hall her son and his friend were sharing a room and David's youngest sister shared the guest room with her husband.

In the realm where reality melted into dreams, Rose found herself looking at a hazy, frozen image of the church that afternoon as everyone paid their respects to the open casket. As her vision cleared, she recognized Bruce and his friend embracing. She studied them, marveling at the sense of belonging she felt by looking in on their private moment.

"My last thoughts on this earth were of the day you left."

"Yeah, it's been on my mind, too." The familiar voices of her husband and son spun Rose around to stare in wonder at the only other people moving in the still dreamscape. Neither man seemed to notice her, though. "That's what he must have tapped into..." Bruce said, gesturing through his mother.

She turned and found herself staring at Bruce's friend.

"Is he really an angel?" David asked.

Rose started, surprised; even more so with her son's answer.

"I don't know. Maybe. This is his vision we're in."

In silence Rose listened to the conversation between father and son, a music she had sadly never expected to hear ever again. Yet here they were, somehow. There was something about Bruce's friend that had enabled it to happen. Hesitantly she reached out to the men frozen in their embrace and placed her hand against the blonde's cheek. She looked hard at him and realized that his eyes stared beyond her, towards the moving, speaking version of Bruce and David. She turned her head to watch them, tuning back into the conversation.

"You were wrong about one thing," David said, "we're not all just stumbling in the dark. You found your destiny..." He drew closer to the embracing friends and nodded at the blond. "At his side."

Bruce swallowed visibly. "If I don't come back, she'll lose the church, the house."

Rose opened her mouth in protest as her husband laughed. "Before everyone decides what's best for Rose Lewis, they better talk to _her_."

"Thank you, David," she said even though he couldn't hear. She smiled at him and watched his face until the dream began to fade.

She woke up slowly, feeling remarkably calm. Turning her head to the side, she could see the outline of the picture frame holding a portrait of the family from a time when Bruce was but a boy. She smiled fondly in remembrance.

"Thank you, God, for keeping my baby boy safe and allowing them to settle their differences. Please continue to protect my son and his friend. I'm sure you will... They're special, aren't they?" She closed her eyes and took a deep breath. She knew now what Bruce had been afraid of all those years ago; yet somehow he managed, by attempting to run away, to discover the path he'd been scared to find. The Lord worked in mysterious ways.

_Let's go home, John. You and me—we have a world to save._

_I have seen the angel. Come and see!_

Fin


End file.
